Method of building chimneys

ABSTRACT

Method of building chimneys or the like characterized by the steps of using one of the upstanding cylinders of the chimney or the like as an elevator shaft, fixing a rack rail vertically on the inner wall of the lowermost unit cylinder fixed on the foundation the cylinder, providing an elevator cage movable up and down along the rack rail engaging with the rack rail and being supplied by electric power, providing an entrance for the elevator cage on the cylinder wall, providing rack rails continuous with said rack rail in the cylinders extended above said fixed cylinder at the same time piling or raising the chimney, providing entrances on said cylinders extended at each of required heights, operating the elevator cage along the rack rail in said extended cylinders, proceeding with construction of the chimney while using the elevator cage for raising and lowering of workers, and proceeding with the work by piling and raising the chimney incorporating the above process in the construction of chimneys or the like.

[ 1 Jan. 30, 1973 [54] METHOD OF BUILDING CHIMNEYS [75] Inventors: Akiyoshi Togiya; Satoshi Kakuda,

both of Hiroshima, Japan [73] Assignee: Mitsubishi Jukogyo Kabushiki Kaisha, Chiyoda-ku, Japan [22] Filed: March 17,197]

[21] Appl. No.: 125,312

[30] Foreign Application Priority Data March 20, 1970 Japan ..45/23908 [52] U.S. Cl. ..29/l55 C, 29/429 [51] Int. Cl ..B23p 17/00, B23p 19/00 [58] Field of Search ..29/155 C, 429, 155 R [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,839,578 l/1932 Morton ..29/429 2,605,540 8/1952 Kroll et al 3,332,132 7/1967 Johnson et al. 3,466,723 9/1969 Durand ..29/l55 C Primary Examiner-Thomas H. Eager AtlorneyCushman, Darby & Cushman [57] ABSTRACT Method of building chimneys or the like characterized by the steps of using one of the upstanding cylinders of the chimney or the like as an elevator shaft, fixing a rack rail vertically on the inner wall of the lowermost unit cylinder fixed on the foundation the cylinder, providing an elevator cage movable up and down along the rack rail engaging with the rack rail and being supplied by electric power, providing an entrance for the elevator cage on the cylinder wall, providing rack rails continuous with said rack rail in the cylinders extended above said fixed cylinder at the same time piling or raising the chimney, providing entrances on said cylinders extended at each of required heights, operating the elevator cage along the rack rail in said extended cylinders, proceeding with construction of the chimney while using theelevator cage for raising and lowering of workers, and proceeding with the work by piling and raising the chimney incorporating the above process in the construction of chimneys or the like.

1 Claim, 4 Drawing Figures METHOD OF BUILDING CHIMNEYS The present invention relates to a method of building chimneys, and more particularly, it relates to a method which proceeds constructing an elevator associated with the chimney in parallel with the building of the chimney, and to proceed the building of the chimney using the elevator for lifting and lowering the workers.

I-Ieretofore, processes of building steel chimneys have widely been used in which, in a piling-up process, a climbing crane or the like is used on the lower construction fixed on the foundation, and the upper constructions are added or extended thereon successively and upwardly, or in a parallel-assembly process, the assembly is effected by lifting parts of a vertical cylinder or the like by jacks or wires together with the crane using the portion, which has been assembled by pilingup process, as the support, and repeating this assembly alternatingly. In either of these processes, since all or a part of the chimney is piled up, the working position shifts gradually upward. In this case the workers working at high level had to' go up and down through stairs annexed to the chimney between the ground and the working position at high level. Especially, in most cases where the chimneys are high, an elevator shaft is provided associated with the chimney for the maintenance. In this case, since the elevator used is usually of a rope hoisting type, the equipments of the elevator are fitted inside the shaft after the building of the chimney is finished, so that is is not possible to use the elevator during the building of the chimney.

The object of the present invention is to make available an elevator for going up and down for the workers utilizing the chimney construction while the chimney is being constructed, and to make it possible to proceed with the assembling of the elevator equipments in parallel with the progress of the chimney construction, and to make it possible to use the elevator by increasing the lifting distance thereof with the progress of the chimney construction.

For this purpose, in this invention, one of the cylinders standing upright on the foundation of the chimney is utilized as an elevator shaft, an elevator of rackpinion type is provided within the lowermost portion of the cylinder which has been fixed on the foundation, the elevator rack rail is provided continuously in cylinders extended on said fixed cylinder with the progress of the chimney construction, and operating the elevator along the rack rail which is extended gradually, whereby the process of piling up or raising of the chimney construction is proceeded by the elevator while utilizing it for lifting and lowering of the workers.

This process can be used for building all the chimneys or similar multi-story buildings having a cylindrical body installed upright on the foundation. With this method, when a chimney is provided with elevator equipments for maintenance, the elevator device annexed thereto can be completed substantially at the same time the building of the chimney is completed. In case where a chimney is not provided with annexed elevator equipments, said elevator equipments can be assembled and used utilizing one of upstanding, smokeexhausting cylinders as the shaft, and after the building of the chimney is finished, it can be removed and used for other chimney construction.

Furthermore, although several days are usually required for building a high chimney, during this period, the workers for chimney construction can go up and down between the ground and the working site at a high level by the elevator safely and rapidly, and machines or devices having small weight can also be raised and lowered thereby, so that the construction work of the chimney or the like can be carried out safely and efficiently.

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is a front elevation showing preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an enlarged plan view taken through a line 11-" in FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is an enlarged plan view taken through a line III-III in FIG. 1.

FIG. 4 is a front elevation showing another embodiment of the present invention.

The invention will now be described with respect to an example referring to the drawings. FIGS. 1 through 3 show the first example in which the method of the present invention is associated and adapted for construction of multileg type chimney provided with an elevator shaft which is to be built according to the general method of a parallel construction.

In the first place, a plurality of lower parts of inclined cylinder members 2 and beams 3 connecting the cylinder members are assembled and fixed on the foundation using a crane provided on the ground.

Next, one unit 4a of the lowermost part of the elevator shaft (hereinafter abbreviated simply as shaft) is fixed on the foundation 1 at the center of the chimney,

' and an entrance 5 is provided on the wall surface of said unit 4a, and inside thereof, there is installed a set of rack-pinion type elevator device 6. As shown in FIG. 2, the elevator device 6 comprises rack rail 7 fixed longitudinally of the inner wall of the shaft 4a, guide rails 8, and a cage 9 so adapted that it can be raised and lowered engaging with the guide rails 8. The cage 9 engages with the rack 7 by means ofa pinion 1 1 driven by a motor 10 fixed on the wall inside the cage, and embracingly engages with a pair of guide rails 8, 8 by means of a plurality of guide rollers 12 fixed on the outer wall of the cage, so that the cage can be mounted displaceable upwardly and downwardly. The cage is further equipped with an appropriate emergency pinion lock mechanism (not shown), and is so adapted that it can be operated by being supplied a power through a cable 14 extending from a cable receiving box 13 provided in the lower shaft 4a.

Next, on the upper portion of the lower shaft 40, there is assembled the uppermost portion 4b of the shaft having a length of substantially one unit of the chimney, mounted inside with the rack rail 7 and the guide rails 8 arranged similar to those of the lower shaft 4a, and the entrance 5 to the elevator is provided at a required height on the wall surface of the shaft. This upper shaft 4b is passed longitudinally in a support ring (not shown) at the central portion of the beam 3 for raising and building the successive intermediate shafts, the lower portion is connected and supported to a pair of raising wires 15 having the fulcrum on the beam 3, and at the top thereof there is provided a rotary derrick 16 for piling and building the upper portions of the smoke exhausting cylinders 2 and a fixed stairs 17 outside the shaft.

Successively thereto, by the winding of the raising wire 15, a shaft portion 4c, having a unit length provided internally with the similar rack rail and guide rails, is inserted between the lower end of the raised upper shaft 4b and the upper end of the fixed shaft 4a secured on the foundation as shown by a broken line in FIG. 1, the rack rail is aligned with the vertical rack rail so that they make a continuous rack rail, the upper end of the shaft portion 4c is welded to the lower end of the upper shaft 4b, and the lower end of the shaft 46 is temporarily secured to the upper end of the fixed shaft 44 with bolts and nuts or the like. In this way, the rack rail in the shaft 4a, 4c, 4b under construction continues, the elevator cage 9 in the shaft 4a is put under a state of being able to operate up to the upper end of the upper shaft 4b on the rack rail, so that the workers can commence to ascend and descend using the elevator.

In the similar manner, piling and assembling the unit length of cylinder portion on each of the smoke exhausting cylinders 2 using the rotary crane l6, and exchanging the hanging points of the wires at the lower end of the shaft 40, and after releasing the temporarily fixed points at the lower end of the shaft 4c, raising the upper portion of the shaft again by winding the wires 15, and inserting the intermediate shaft thereunder in the similar manner. At this time, the elevator cage 9 in the shaft is lowered into the fixed shaft so that the cage will not interfere the insertion of the intermediate shafts.

By repeating the same procedure, the assembling of the shaft terminates at the same time the assembling of the chimney is terminated, so that the elevator device can be used for maintenance of the chimney just as it is, and when the rotary derrick l6 and the wires 15 are removed, the building of the chimney is entirely completed.

FIG. 4 shows the second example where the method according to the present invention is adapted and combined for building and piling up a chimney which supports four upstanding exhausting cylinders 102 inside a steel tower 103 using a known climbing derrick 104 which goes up and down engaging with the internal surfaces of the smoke exhausting cylinders 102 at the central portion of the chimney.

This example shows a chimney which is not provided with an elevator equipment belonging to the completed chimney, and wherein the building is proceeded while using one (102) of the four smoke exhausting cylinders as the elevator shaft during the construction period.

First, one or two unit heights of smoke exhaust cylinder 102 and the lower parts of the steel tower 103 are piled up and built on the foundation 101 using a crane installed on the ground, and at this time, the lower-most unit cylinder 102'a is fixed on the foundation 101, and after the entrance 105 is provided on the wall and the rackpinion type elevator similar to those shown in FIG. 2 is installed therein, one of the smoke exhausting cylinders 102 is built thereon by piling up successively the upper portions provided internally with the rack rail and guide rails as in FIG. 3 while making continue the rack rails and the guide rails, and the entrances are provided on the cylinder walls at each of required heights.

Accordingly in this case, it is possible to carry out the piling operation of a chimney by going up to the height at which the piling work is to be effected using the elevator u to the height of the entrance.

When t e piling operation 18 finished, the climbing crane and the elevator is removed, and the entrances on the cylinder wall are stopped up and the chimney is finished. In this case, the elevator equipments can be used together with the crane for further building of neighboring chimneys.

The method according to the present invention can also be applied by combining it with other processes for all chimneys having at least one upright cylinder in addition to above-shown two examples.

In the present invention, one of the upright cylinders of the chimney or the like is utilized for an elevator shaft, and the method comprises using one of the upstanding cylinders of a chimney or the like as an elevator shaft, fixing rack rail vertically on the inner cylinder wall of the lowermost unit cylinder fixed on the foundation of the cylinder, providing an elevator cage movable up and down along the rack rail engaging with the rack rail and being supplied by electric power, providing entrance to the elevator cage on the cylinder wall, providing rack rails which continue with said rack rails in the extended cylinders above said fixed cylinder together with provision for piling or raising equipment of the chimney, providing entrances on the extended cylinders at each of the required height, operating the elevator cage along the rack rail in said extended cylinders, proceeding the building of the chimney while using the elevator for raising and lowering the workers, making possible the up and down operation of the elevator utilizing the chimney cylinder during the construction by causing to include the present method in the constructing work of the chimney or the like, whereby it is possible to effect the raising and lowering of workers or small machines safely and promptly thus to improve the working efficiency of building chimneys or the like.

What is claimed is:

1. Method of building chimneys or the like characterized by the steps of using one of the upstanding cylinders of the chimney or the like as an elevator shaft, fixing a rack rail vertically on the inner wall of the lowermost unit cylinder fixed on the foundation of the cylinder, providing an elevator cage movable up and down along the rack rail engaging with the rack rail and being supplied by electric power, providing an entrance for the elevator cage on the cylinder wall, providing rack rails continuous with said rack rail in the cylinders extended above said fixed cylinder at the same time pil- I ing or raising the chimney, providing entrances on said cylinders extended at each of required heights, operating the elevator cage along the rack rail in said extended cylinders, proceeding with construction of the chimney while using the elevator cage for raising and lowering of workers, and proceeding with the work by piling and raising the chimney incorporating the above process in the construction of chimneys or the like.

* III I k 

1. Method of building chimneys or the like characterized by the steps of using one of the upstanding cylinders of the chimney or the like as an elevator shaft, fixing a rack rail vertically on the inner wall of the lowermost unit cylinder fixed on the foundation of the cylinder, providing an elevator cage movable up and down along the rack rail engaging with the rack rail and being supplied by electric power, providing an entrance for the elevator cage on the cylinder wall, providing rack rails continuous with said rack rail in the cylinders extended above said fixed cylinder at the same time piling or raising the chimney, providing entrances on said cylinders extended at each of required heights, operating the elevator cage along the rack rail in said extended cylinders, proceeding with construction of the chimney while using the elevator cage for raising and lowering of workers, and proceeding with the work by piling and raising the chimney incorporating the above process in the construction of chimneys or the like. 